


dropping in

by windupclock



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: M/M, they're soft and dumb and i love them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-24
Updated: 2019-06-24
Packaged: 2020-05-18 23:38:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19345027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/windupclock/pseuds/windupclock
Summary: Andrew Minyard shows up at practice one day, and no one has any idea how to react.





	dropping in

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this several months ago and am just posting it now, fully without rereading it. gay rights!

Andrew Minyard shows up at practice one day, and no one has any idea how to react.  
  
He comes in twenty minutes in, and although his bootsteps are heavy and loud, no one notices him winding his way through the seats until he’s sitting in the front row behind the home goal, feet propped on the divider between the stands and the court. They play with a laser focus Andrew doesn’t envy for a second, as if the game is the only thing that matters to them. It’s a far cry from the way Andrew played in his sophomore year, his face blank behind his gear. These people care about the sport in a way that Andrew doesn’t think he ever will, even after a year on a professional team of his own, and he doesn’t hate watching it.  
  
He especially doesn’t hate it when Neil is playing, not that he would ever let that slip. Neil is fierce and determined on the court, with five more years of practice and refinement but the same amount of passion as the first time Andrew watched him play in Millport. He’s good at what he does (which, again, Andrew would never tell him), and Andrew, damn it all, likes seeing him so happy.  
  
It takes fifteen more minutes for someone to notice him. A tall woman Andrew assumes is the captain calls for a break (Andrew imagines Kevin’s horrified scoff at the idea and grins to himself), and while a long-haired backliner is tilting her head back to drink, her eyes catch on him and she freezes.  
  
She tugs on the captain’s sleeve and whispers something, and then there are two pairs of eyes on Andrew. He waves.  
  
“You can’t–” she starts to say, but then she squints and a lightbulb goes off, undoubtedly putting together Andrew's presence with his blond hair and bad posture and all-black attire. Her eyes widen, and she turns back around.  
  
There’s more whispering, but nothing loud enough for Andrew to catch, and no one says anything directly to him for the rest of practice. They just stare at him and whisper and pretend not to be looking when he stares back.  
  
The only exception, of course, is Neil. He meets Andrew's eyes exactly once, his face impassive, and then turns to talk to one of his teammates as if his boyfriend isn’t right there in the stands. He doesn’t acknowledge Andrew's presence whatsoever, and Andrew is sort of thrilled.  
  
For the rest of practice, after that eye contact, Neil doesn’t miss a single shot, and Andrew doesn’t take his eyes off him.  


* * *

“That’s Andrew Minyard,” Jemma hisses, her voice filled with equal parts awe and terror. “What is he doing here?”

  
Sunny shakes her head, eyes flicking up to where Minyard sprawls in the stands. “I have no fucking idea, but I don’t like it.”  
  
Minyard is deservedly notorious – people haven’t forgotten about his year of probation or his friendship with Kevin Day or the fact that, regardless of how short he is, he has yet to lose a fight on the court, and they sure as hell haven’t forgotten about what a formidable goalkeeper he is. Jemma still gets goosebumps whenever she watches the tape of the Foxes’ final game against the Ravens her freshman year. Thirteen missed out of one hundred and fifty attempted. The statistics speak for themselves. Minyard is terrifying.  
  
It’s fair to say that Jemma is slightly awestruck at having him in her stadium. She thought Neil Josten was bad enough; tiny, determined Neil Josten, who she watched mouth off to Riko Moriyama on national television and live to make good on his promise to beat him, but Minyard is next level.  
  
“Think it’s got something to do with Josten?” Sunny asks. She has to stoop slightly in order to whisper properly into Jemma's ear. “I mean, everyone knows they went to Palmetto together…”  
  
“Yeah, but are they friends?” Jemma twists to stare at Josten, who is staring at his shoes as he reties the laces. “Like, close enough that Minyard would drop by his practice unannounced? That seems weird.”  
  
Sunny shrugs, but the downward curve of her mouth tells Jemma she thinks it’s weird too.  


* * *

Neil finds Andrew waiting in the locker room after practice.

  
He juts his chin in vague acknowledgement and receives a bemused Andrew smile in response, complete with the wrinkling of his eyebrows that Neil, after five years of learning to read Andrew, knows means he thinks Neil is cute.  
  
He showers and gets changed in record time, barely feeling the lukewarm water against his skin, and he’s probably still slightly gross when he heads out, but Andrew is still there, leaning against Neil's locker, head buried pointedly in his phone, and Neil doesn’t regret it for a second. Especially not when Andrew looks up, and he's scowling but his eyes are fond, and Neil is so in love.  
  
“How'd you know this was my locker?” he asks, his tone somewhere in the realm of casual. “Stalker.”  
  
Andrew thumps his hand against the 03 printed on the front of the locker. “You're predictable, junkie.”  
  
Neil can’t help but grin. Ordinarily, lockers are assigned by jersey number, but number three in this year’s lineup is a girl and no one objected to Neil claiming the men’s room locker for himself. His first instinct was 10, but that was taken, and Neil wasn’t sentimental or stupid enough to ask.  
  
“Yeah, well, you’re not supposed to be back for four more days, idiot,” he counters.  
  
“And you're complaining?” Andrew lifts one eyebrow.  
  
“I never said that.” Neil’s hand is hovering between them, an inch away from Andrew’s elbow. “Yes or no?”  
  
“Yes,” Andrew says immediately.   
  
The kiss is fleeting, because Neil isn’t fully ready to have the ‘ _I'm gay and dating Andrew fucking Minyard_ ’ conversation with his teammates, but it’s good nonetheless, Andrew’s stubble brushing against Neil’s chin.  
  
“Missed you,” he says softly after they pull apart, and his tone is no longer anywhere near casual. His hand is still warm on Andrew’s elbow.  
  
“Missed you too, dumbass.”


End file.
